1171. Stood afar off.- That this signifies not so now, in those things by reason of fear, is evident from the signification of standing afar off, which denotes to be in externals, concerning which see above (n. 1133); in this case, therefore, not to be in that foolish wisdom, intelligence, and knowledge, from which they before, through fear, confirmed the evils and falsities of their religion and its doctrine; for fear causes man to remove himself from these things when he sees those who were of such a character punished and tormented.
Continuation.- To the preceding observations we will add the following:-
1. That before reformation the light of the understanding is like the light of the moon, clear according to the knowledges of truth and good; but after reformation it is like the light of the sun, clear according to the application of the knowledges of truth and good to the uses of life.
[2] 2. The reason why the understanding has not been destroyed is that man may be able to know truths, and from them see the evils of his will; and when he sees these, may be able to resist them as if from himself, and thus be reformed.
[3] 3. But still, man is not reformed by virtue of understanding but by means of his understanding acknowledging truths, and from these seeing evils; for the operation of the Lord's Divine Providence is into the love of man's will, and from that love into the understanding, and not from his understanding into the love of his will.
[4] 4. That the love of the will, according to its quality, imparts intelligence; natural love from spiritual giving intelligence in things civil and moral; but spiritual love in natural giving intelligence in spiritual things. But love merely natural, and the conceit arising from it, imparts no intelligence in spiritual things, but rather gives the faculty of confirming whatsoever it pleases, and after such confirmation the understanding is so infatuated that it sees falsity as truth, and evil as good. This love, however, does not take away the faculty of understanding truths in their own light; it takes it away when it is present, but not when it is absent.
[5] 5. When the will is reformed and the wisdom which belongs to the understanding becomes that of the love which belongs to the will, or when wisdom becomes the love of truth and of good in its own form, then man is like a garden, in the time of spring, when heat is united to light, imparting life (animam) to the germinations. Spiritual germinations are the productions of wisdom from love, and there are in this case in every production a soul from that love, and its clothing from wisdom. The will is therefore like a father, and the understanding like a mother.
[6] 6. Such then is the life of man, not only the life of his mind (animus), but also that of his body, because the life of the mind acts in unison with the life of the body by correspondences. For the life of the will or love corresponds to the life of the heart, and the life of the understanding or wisdom corresponds to the life of the lungs; and these are the two sources of the life of the body. That this is the case is unknown, nevertheless it is from this fact that an evil man cannot live in heaven, nor a good man in hell. For each of these becomes as it were dead, if he is not among those with whom the life of his will and that of his understanding originating in it act in unison; among such, and among such only, does his heart beat responsively and his lungs breathe freely.
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